Intercity coach travel in the UK still among cheapest in Europe

Sheona Small

Comparing prices on intercity coach travel could save you pounds on the ticket price.

And with new coach companies from Europe looking to the UK, there could be further savings ahead.

Coach travel in the UK is third cheapest in Europe.

Latest figures from CheckMyBus show the cheapest ticket available for travelling between Edinburgh and Glasgow was £1 compared to the most expensive charge £7.50, while Newcstle to Edinburgh could cost as little as £8 or as much as £17.

The international bus search engine looks at prices across Europe and the UK is ranked third behind France and Germany.

CheckMyBus calculates the European intercity bus price index, which analyses the top ten connections in the individual countries.

The top two spots are taken by France with an average of only 1.05 pence per kilometre and Germany with 1.85 pence per kilometre, compared to 2.41 pence per kilometre in the UK.

One explanation was that the market for low-cost intercity buses was only recently opened up in Germany (2013) and France (2015) and heated competition between young coach companies was resulting in particularly inexpensive tickets.

On the other hand, in Spain, where travel is 3.64 per per kilometre, the coach market is subject to strict regulations, which is why taking the bus is most expensive there.

The site maintains that Britain, with a well established coach market, manages to prove that inexpensive bus journeys are still possible even after prices have reached a plateau and the initial race for market leadership is over.

However, the competition is likely to be rekindled as FlixBus targets the UK.

Last week the German market leader launched a connection from Paris to London, with ticket prices starting at €9 – a connection which travellers have had to pay at least £15 until now.

CheckMyBus says that FlixBux subsidiaries FlixBus Italia and FlixBus France have forced existing and new coach companies in these countries to re-evaluate their prices when faced with special deals and €1-tickets and the same might hold true for the UK.